A wide variety of video recorders are available in the marketplace. Most people own, or are familiar with, a video cassette recorder (VCR), also referred to as a video tape recorder (VTR). A video cassette recorder records video programs on magnetic cassette tapes. More recently, video recorders have appeared in the market that use computer magnetic hard disks rather than magnetic cassette tapes to store video programs. For example, the ReplayTV™ recorder and the TiVO™ recorder digitally record television programs on hard disk drives using, for example, an MPEG video compression standard. Additionally, some video recorders may record on a readable/writable, digital versatile disk (DVD) rather than a magnetic disk.
The widespread use of video recorders has generated and continues to generate large volumes of videotaped materials. Because a video recorder captures both video signals and audio signals, videotaped materials are multimedia materials. A number of different types of automatic computerized systems and methods have been developed for analyzing, indexing, and retrieving videotaped multimedia materials.
The automatic computerized systems and methods that exist for analyzing videotaped multimedia materials are generally capable of identifying segments of a video program that contain topics identified by a user. The desired segments are usually identified based upon search keywords that the user provides to the system.
An automatic computerized multimedia retrieval system that allows users to identify and select portions of videotaped multimedia materials usually meets three requirements. First, a system and method is usually available for parsing a video signal into its video, audio, and text components. Second, a system and method is usually available for analyzing the content of the video, audio, and text components of the videotaped multimedia signal with respect to user input criteria and segmenting the components based on content. Third, a system and method is usually available for integrating and storing program segments that match the user's search criteria.
A system that meets these requirements is described in U.S. patent application Ser. No. 09/006,657 filed Jan. 13, 1998 by Dimitrova et al. entitled “Multimedia Computer System with Story Segmentation Capability and Operating Program Therefor Including Finite Automaton Video Parser.” U.S. patent application Ser. No. 09/006,657 is hereby incorporated herein by reference within this document for all purposes as if fully set forth herein.
U.S. patent application Ser. No. 09/006,657 describes a system and method that provides a set of models for recognizing a sequence of symbols, a matching model that identifies desired selection criteria, and a methodology for selecting and retrieving one or more video story segments or sequences based upon the selection criteria.
Another system that meets these requirements is described in U.S. patent application Ser. No. 09/442,960 filed Nov. 18, 1999 by Dimitrova et al. entitled “Method and Apparatus for Audio/Data/Visual Information Selection.” U.S. patent application Ser. No. 09/442,960 is hereby incorporated herein by reference within this document for all purposes as if fully set forth herein.
There is a need for an improved system and method for automatically analyzing the content of videotaped multimedia presentations. In particular, there is a need for an improved system and method for creating a table of contents of a videotaped multimedia presentation.